by Graham Ison
‘You married again now?’ asked Tipper.
‘Not bloody likely,’ said Lambert vehemently. ‘Once bitten, as they say.’
Tipper stood up. ‘Thanks for your help, Mr Lambert.’
‘Aren’t you supposed to say something like “We may have to see you again”, or “Don’t leave town”?’
Tipper smiled. ‘I’m sure we’ll be able to find you if we need to, Mr Lambert.’
Chapter Four
The telephone call came the second day after Tipper and Markham had seen James Lambert. An ex-policeman working for a cross-Channel ferry company somewhat apologetically rang to say that a grip had been left on their Portsmouth to St Malo service some weeks back and had been placed, as was the custom, in the lost property store at the British port. During a sort out it had been opened and had been found to contain, among other things, a passport in the name of Mrs Penelope Lambert. The grip had been placed in a plastic bag by the Portsmouth scenes-of-crime officer who had then brought it to Scotland Yard — a necessary procedure to preserve the continuity of evidence. The Portsmouth police had been thorough. The officer also brought a bundle of statements proving the link from the delivering officer right back to the deck-hand who had found it, abandoned in one of the luggage bays in the passenger lounge.
The senior fingerprint officer and the liaison officer from the forensic science laboratory came to see Harry Tipper together. They brought the grip and placed it on a side table in his office.
‘Fairly common sort of heavy nylon grip, Harry,’ said the lab man briskly. ‘Obtainable at most outlets. And contained …’ He emptied the grip gently onto the table. ‘The top half of a well-known bikini …’ He pushed a bra towards Tipper with a hand encased in a plastic glove. ‘And five pairs of briefs, ditto bras. A sun dress, two ordinary dresses — acrylic, six pairs of tights, pair of shorts, a towelling beachrobe, pair of sandals, pair of court shoes. There’s also the usual bits and pieces, like a quantity of cosmetics, a can of hair spray and a hairbrush, a few handkerchiefs, some tissues and finally, a passport and camera.’ He picked up the last two items and placed them in front of Tipper.
Tipper pointed to the camera. ‘Anything in that?’
‘Nope! It’s been taken out. I checked with the police at Portsmouth, and they’ve interviewed everyone who handled the grip. None of them has taken the film. I can only assume that the person or persons unknown took it — and I can think of a very good reason in the circumstances.’
‘So can I,’ said Tipper. ‘Photography seems to be playing a pretty large part in this enquiry.’
‘You will doubtless be interested to know,’ said the fingerprint officer, ‘that we found a half impression on the camera — on the inside. It could have been left by the person who removed the film — it’s in the right place. And it’s almost certainly identical with one of the sets on the letter of resignation. It’d never go to court because I haven’t got sixteen points, but I’d put money on it. Sorry I can’t be more helpful.’
‘And the passport?’
‘No chance. Can’t get a single worthwhile print off that.’ He smiled ruefully. ‘But then you wouldn’t expect me to, would you, Harry?’
‘Always hope,’ said Tipper with a smile.
After the experts had left, Tipper took a pair of plastic gloves out of his desk drawer, and putting them on, poked about among the late Mrs Lambert’s belongings. He had no hope of finding anything that had been overlooked; both the laboratory and the fingerprint branch were very thorough.
‘Bloody marvellous,’ said Markham acidly.
‘Two more actions,’ said Tipper. ‘One — find Darwin. Two — try for a passenger list, or a loading manifest on that cross-Channel ferry for the day this lot was abandoned. I don’t think we’ve got a hope in hell, but we’ve got to try.’
Markham shrugged. ‘We don’t even know for certain that it was found on the same day that it was left there, sir.’
‘True, Charlie, but you know the rules.’
Markham sighed and left the office to set in train what both he and Tipper believed would be another useless enquiry.
*
The second action was resolved first, and quickly. The purser was adamant that the grip would have been found at the end of the voyage on which it was abandoned. He regarded as a personal slight the suggestion that the crew would have overlooked it. The ship, he said, was cleaned from stem to stern after every voyage. In any event, said the purser, that particular crewman had started a week’s leave that day; so the luggage was definitely handed in on the Monday morning. But the passenger manifest was a different matter. There was now no record and a check with head office produced the same result. The chief clerk plaintively asserted that if they were to keep all the booking forms that long, the office would be buried in paper. Which was a pity, because the grip had been left there during the night crossing which had docked at Portsmouth exactly sixty minutes after Colonel Matthieu had discovered the body of Penelope Lambert.
*
Charlie Markham was quite disappointed with Bob Darwin’s studio. There wasn’t a naked woman anywhere to be seen. In fact the only occupant, when they called, was Darwin himself.
‘Don’t often see the law in here,’ he said. ‘Leastways, not since the bad old days of the porn squad. Know what I mean?’ He winked. ‘Well, gents, and what can I do for you? If you’re looking for dirty books, I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong casino. Straight photographer is Bob Darwin — ask anyone round here.’
‘We’re investigating a murder, Mr Darwin.’ Tipper knew how to sort out the Darwins of this world.
The bravado evaporated. ‘Murder? Now just hold on. I don’t know anything about a murder. I mean when was this?’
‘I understand,’ said Tipper, ‘that you once employed a Mrs Penelope Lambert?’
‘No — at least I can’t remember anyone of that name.’
Tipper nodded to Markham who produced a photograph from his pocket. It wasn’t the one provided by the gendarmerie, but one which the detectives had found in her flat.
‘This woman,’ said Tipper.
‘That’s Penny Gaston — yes, I remember her all right.’
‘Gaston? Is that what she called herself?’
‘I don’t know about “called herself”. I only ever knew her as that.’
Tipper made a mental note to run a check at St Catherine’s House — the General Register Office — to see if Gaston had been the girl’s maiden name. ‘When was she working here?’ he asked.
‘Well on and off from about six or seven years back.’
‘By on and off I take it you mean she was a casual rather than a full-time employee?’
Darwin laughed. ‘I haven’t got any full-time employees here, apart from the cleaner who comes in three times a week. No, Penny was a model. You don’t employ them — you just hire ’em when you need them. But she was very good was Penny. She’ll go places that girl.’
‘Not any more,’ said Markham laconically. ‘She’s dead.’
‘Oh my God!’ said Darwin. ‘Is it her you’re talking about?’
Tipper nodded. ‘I’m afraid so. When did you last see her, Mr Darwin?’
Darwin looked pensive. ‘It could only have been a few weeks ago. I’d have to look at my diary, but I think she was in about the beginning of August. I’d got a nail-varnish job to do, bit swift. Very good hands Penny’d got — apart from everything else, of course.’ He gave a lascivious leer.
‘Did she ever work for any other photographers, d’you know?’
Darwin laughed. ‘You’d better believe it. With a figure like she’d got, they were falling over each other.’
Tipper decided it was time to knock this popinjay over. ‘How long did she live with you, Mr Darwin?’
‘Bloody hell,’ said Darwin. ‘You don’t pull any punches, do you?’
‘Well?’
Darwin considered the question. ‘For about six months — it was a good six mon
ths,’ he said reflectively. ‘Then I threw her out.’ He added the last apprehensively. The police might be thinking that he had had something to do with her death.
‘Why?’
‘I found she was having it off with some other photographer.’ He spread his hands. ‘I didn’t really mind that — I’m very broad-minded, but I was bloody well keeping her. So I told her to make up her mind. And she did, the cow — she went.’
‘Name?’
‘Now look, fellahs …’
‘Name?’ asked Tipper again.
Darwin paused, reluctant. ‘Charley Godley,’ he said.
‘Address?’
‘Wardour Court. It’s not far from here — up towards Berners Street.’
‘I know where it is, Mr Darwin. How long ago did she go?’
Darwin scratched at his dyed hair — Markham noted that it was all still there. ‘’Bout four years ago. Mind you, I’ve seen her from time to time since, like I said. She did quite a few jobs for me. She was very good.’
‘So we’ve been hearing,’ said Markham.
‘She was a great girl to have about the place. Full of fun. We lived upstairs here.’ He pointed towards the ceiling. ‘There was no holding her when she got going. Organise a party at the drop of a hat. If she’d had a good week — you know, plenty of sessions, she’d come in with a couple of bottles of champagne. I’d have to match them and we’d have a private party. Christ, she was a wild one. But dangerous. She kept trying to talk me into the porn business. Offered to do poses for me — quite uninhibited, she was. But I’m not into that.’
Markham gave him a cynical look.
‘No really,’ he said. ‘It’s too bloody risky these days. Your blokes from West End Central would be down here like a shot. It’s just not worth it.’
‘Did she mention her husband at all?’ asked Tipper.
‘Husband? When did she get married then?’
‘Before she came to live with you, Mr Darwin.’
‘Get off. Really?’ Tipper nodded. ‘She never mentioned being married, not once. Are you sure?’
‘Very,’ said Tipper.
‘Well the saucy little cow. Mind you, nothing’d surprise me about her. You never knew what she was going to get up to next. I was better off when she went, to be quite honest. She frightened me at times. D’you know she came down here one afternoon when I’d got a session going, just wearing a bottle of champagne and nothing else. Smashed, she was — absolutely smashed. Gave me a right bollocking for not joining her party and then collapsed on the floor — out cold.’
‘Upset your customers did it?’
‘Not really, no. I’d only got one queer doing men’s underwear. Didn’t bat an eyelid — well he wouldn’t would he? Still they’re used to it round here. Happens all the time.’
‘Would you be prepared to let us have a set of your fingerprints, for elimination purposes, Mr Darwin?’
He looked doubtful. ‘What’s that for, then?’
‘You don’t have to, of course. But it makes it easier for us to reduce the field of suspects — by taking out the innocent marks. It leaves us with just one set — we hope.’
‘Yes. All right.’ But he still sounded reluctant.
‘Charley Godley, you say?’
‘That’s right,’ said Darwin, and laughed.
‘I’ll bet we’ve got his dabs on file already,’ said Markham, once they were back in the street.
‘Racing certainty, I should think,’ said Tipper.
*
The front door was open, and Tipper and Markham mounted the uncarpeted wooden staircase. The large front room of what, years ago, had been a fashionable town house, was the photographer’s studio; lights, tripods, a few papier mâché Grecian columns, and the other paraphernalia of the trade, gave an impression of utter chaos.
On a podium at one end of the room stood an effeminate young man, striking an unnatural pose, and displaying a bottle of aftershave lotion.
The photographer, busily moving about and taking shot after shot with a hand-held camera, was a woman. Tipper estimated that she was about forty years old. She was wearing a pair of faded jeans and a man’s shirt outside them. Her long grey hair was worn in a single pigtail that reached almost to her waist, braided very tightly off the face to reveal sharply sculpted but not unattractive features.
She glanced briefly at the two policemen and carried on with her work. ‘Be with you shortly, loves,’ she said over her shoulder. A few minutes later she put her camera down and stretched her arms above her head. ‘That’ll do, Jason. Thank you, love.’
The young man stepped down to the floor and donned a leather jacket. The photographer opened a cash-box, counted out some bank notes and gave them to her model. ‘See you, love,’ she said, and waited until his footsteps had receded down the stairs before turning to the two detectives.
‘Now dears, what can I do for you?’ She studied their faces in turn, carefully, as if appraising their photogenic qualities.
‘We’re police officers,’ said Tipper.
The woman nodded. ‘I thought so.’
‘We’re looking for Mr Godley.’
The woman threw back her head and laughed. ‘You and me both,’ she said. ‘I haven’t seen the bastard in years.’ Her voice was well modulated and attractive, the accent that of an educated woman; the language she used sounded strange in those tones.
‘Mr Charles Godley — Charley Godley.’
‘Uh uh!’ She shook her head. ‘Tony was his name. I’m Charley — short for Charlotte.’ She smiled. ‘Thanks to my father who was a great lover of the Brontë sisters. Not physically of course.’ She paused, and laughed again.
Tipper wanted to get it right. ‘You’re Charley Godley?’
‘S’right!’ She smiled once more. ‘Well everybody’s got to be somebody.’
‘Did you know a Mrs Penelope Lambert?’
‘Yes, I did. She wasn’t known as that, though. Always called herself Penny Gaston, but yes, I did know her. Why?’
Tipper ignored the question. ‘Did she live here at one time?’
‘Not here. This is my workshop. No, she lived with me at my house at Richmond.’ She thrust her hands into the pockets of her jeans. ‘We had a lesbian relationship.’ She looked Tipper straight in the eyes with an unwavering stare.
‘I see.’ Tipper realised now why Darwin had laughed.
‘I doubt if you do,’ she said. ‘Men don’t usually. They’re so damned chauvinistic that it hurts their ego to think that a woman can be attracted by another woman and be quite satisfied with that.’
‘Who was Tony then?’
‘My husband.’
‘Oh!’
‘And no, he didn’t leave me because I was a lesbian, because I wasn’t then. Anyway, what is this — an enquiry into my private life, or are you really a television crew doing a fly-on-the-wall programme?’
‘No — it’s an enquiry into Penelope Lambert’s private life. When did you last see her, Mrs Godley?’
She didn’t answer immediately, but walked across to a table and poured half a tumbler of Scotch. She turned, holding the bottle in the air, a questioning expression on her face.
‘No thank you,’ said Tipper. Markham said nothing.
She took a mouthful of the neat spirit and walked back to the detectives, still holding the glass. ‘Eight or nine weeks ago — something like that. Why what’s she done?’
‘Got herself murdered, Mrs Godley.’
Charley Godley’s expression did not change. ‘I can’t say I’m surprised,’ she said, without emotion. ‘Can’t say I’m surprised at all.’
‘Why is that?’
‘She played the field did Penny. Always got some man in tow — but never for long.’
‘You mean she was a prostitute?’
‘Not in so many words, love, no. But she was — what’s that lovely computer expression — user-friendly?’
‘How long was she living with you, Mrs Godley?’<
br />
‘Call me Charley, love — everybody does.’ She hesitated, pouting. ‘About a year, I suppose.’
‘And then?’
‘She left.’ Charley Godley shrugged at life’s inevitabilities. ‘Went to live with a fellah. She’s what round here they call ambidextrous. Quite inappropriate use of the term, of course.’
‘But you continued to see her from time to time?’
‘Oh yes. We didn’t part bad friends. It just seemed better that we didn’t live together any more.’
‘When did you first get to know her?’
‘A good four years ago, I should think. She just waltzed in one day. Mind you a lot of girls do that — mainly from out of town, from the sticks. Come to London thinking their fanny’s their fortune, but find out too late that it’s not. I could see that she’d got that sparkle — you pick it up very quickly in this business if you’re going to survive — that something that comes through the camera and out the other side. Well in she came and said she was looking for work. Funnily enough I’d just got a job to do for a shower company —’
‘Shower company?’ Tipper interrupted.
‘Yes, love. Firm that makes showers. You know, you stand under ’em and get wet — and clean.’
Tipper smiled. ‘Yes of course. Go on.’
‘Well girls willing to do a nude pose aren’t as easy to find as you might think — not when they’re going to be spread all over the newspapers and the rest, but she didn’t hesitate. Mind you hunger does some strange things. Anyway, I put it to her and she agreed.’
Suddenly aware that she and the policemen were all still standing Charley sat down on a chair and smiled. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, ‘keeping you standing. Do sit down. The furniture’s not up to much, but I don’t usually entertain here.’
Tipper and Markham pulled up a couple of cane chairs — chairs which had seen better days — and sat down facing the woman.
‘Apparently,’ said Charley, when she was settled, ‘she’d just had the mother and father of all rows with her bloke. Apparently he’d put it to her that she ought to do some porn movies. Well, she said she didn’t mind doing some skin stuff — that’s what we call the nude poses in the trade — but she drew the line at the porno. She said he was always on about it and it was beginning to get on her nerves …’